Thursday, September 27, 2012

Doing 2 back-to-back Fiber Festivals takes stamina and energy. I am happy to report that Jim and I are not only alive but happy campers too.

We picked up T in Ithaca and had a nice uneventful drive to Hemlock, NY.

Here's our booth at the Finger Lakes Fiber Festival at the start of Saturday's show.

And Jim and T spindling away.

Apologies for not getting the name of this young lady who looks so good in the Starflower Beret.

FLFF was fantastic and the weather too. Major thanks to T as we couldn't have done it without you.

We spent Monday - Thursday trying to fill in on stock. It was a happy thing to need to do but very long hours each day.

Then on Friday morning we set off for Greenwich and the upper Hudson, finally arriving 5 hours and many road construction delays later. Those are the Green Mountains in the distance as we come into Schuylerville.

Our booth at the Southern Adirondack Fiber Festival with Aaron as our assistant for the weekend.

On the other side of the black curtain was felting demos both days.

Plus the spinning nuns from St Mary's were back with their cashmere goats.

The weekend was good, friendly and our new location helped a lot. Major thanks to Aaron and his friend, David, who traveled down from Montreal. Fun to share time with you both.

Jim decided that we would travel home on the 2 sides of the triangle (Albany to Syracuse, Syracuse to Homer to Ithaca) and leave the hypoteneuse (rt 88) to the road construction. The mileage may have been longer but the time sure wasn't.

The clouds, as we drove along the Mohawk River, were delightfully dramatic.

Now to catch up on paperwork, pet Basel a lot, put the shop back to rights and prep for the next show.

Wednesday, September 5, 2012

Let me start by saying that I have no problems at all with items made in other countries for companies that are based in that country and then sold here. I think everyone who wants to work should have that opportunity. What I have problems with is American corporations who close American plants, let go the workers and then outsource those jobs overseas for a pittance of what they would pay an American worker, yet sell the items here for the same old price, therefore garnering themselves a hefty profit.

When I find those companies I try to avoid purchasing from them if I can find something just as good or substitutable that is made here or just do without. That is one reason I do not enter Walmart, but that's a whole 'nother discussion on why a company pays its workers so little that they need food stamps to survive.

I have been using iContact for my newsletters for 4 years now. Over that time I have called their Help line several times and always gotten great help, even on the weekends. Recently their website was being funky so I called again. The answers I received seemed to be rather pat, sort of like she was reading them. Odd, and then I realized that English was not the woman's first language. I then asked her where she was and she told me "In the Philippines." Odd again, as the last guy I spoke with had a southern US accent and I know this company is based in the south. I wound up calling several times as the answers were really not helpful and so finally asked for a supervisor. He also told me he was in the Phillippines. I have no problem with those folks having a nice job, but I do with people who are repeating stock answers and not solving my problem.

Then I realized that iContact had OUTSOURCED its Help staff, putting quite a few Americans out of work. NO NO NO NO. I will not be helping some CEO to buy his second yacht. Immediately I instituted a web search for other reputable newsletter hosts.

I asked a bunch of questions and found ConstantContact who have offices in Boston, MA, Colorado and the UK and have no intention of outsourcing any of their staff. I spoke with a couple of their people who were ever so helpful in guiding me through removing my extensive email list from iContact and uploading it to ConstantContact. They also helped me start a new newsletter template, learn their imagery system and were generally quite pleasant and easy to work with. All this to let you know that tomorrow's and future newsletters will be hosted by this company who I hope to work with for a long time.